DAY 17

And Ruth said, Entreat me not to leave thee, or to return from following after thee; for whither thou goest, I will go; and where thou lodgest, I will lodge: thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God: Where thou diest, will I die, and there will I be buried: the Lord do so to me and more also, if aught but death part thee and me. - Ruth 1:16 - 17. (Ruth, if you remember, had lost her husband and was facing a very uncertain future.)

One of the people that has had a great influence upon my life is my step-grandmother (Ruth). Her first marriage ended only a year or so after their daughter was born. She married my grandfather many years later in middle age, they had about six good years together until my grandfather's health deteriorated.

My grandfather was unable to work, essentially bound to the house, had a leg amputated with health sliding downwards. Ruth continued to work and faithfully care for my grandfather during these seven to eight years. She eventually remarried but this only lasted for about a year. Now she is in her nineties and living in a mobile home with her daughter (her daughter is a widow). She has had a tough life but, oh, what an example she has been to me, and to many, many others. An example of faith in spite of the bad, in spite of the storms of life, a faith that just keeps on shining through even now. I don't know Ruth's real first name. When she went to school in the first grade she didn't like her name and told every one that she was "Ruth." How fitting!

Most likely if life is tough for you there are those who are watching marveling at your faith. Your life is molding the lives of those around you just as the life of my step grandmother has molded mine.